Post-Mumbai, War on Terror Takes a New Direction
What effect the terror attacks will have on Pakistan’s internal politics will undoubtedly be tied to any possible military action between itself and India. Escalating tensions and the possibility of war will feed the extremist elements. As proved time and again during Musharraf’s presidency, the government itself is divided on its relations with the terrorist organizations operating within its borders, including al-Qaeda. While the administration claims to oppose terrorism, the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) agency has actively cooperated with these groups, providing training, weapons, and funding. At best, the Pakistani government’s handling of terrorism has been weak and ineffective.
Included in the fallout will be those issues directly affecting the U.S. and other Western countries. The most obvious is the apparent targeting of Westerners and Jews in the attacks. By Saturday evening six Americans had been confirmed killed with possibly more still to be identified. Several Canadians, Brits, and Australians are also among the dead. The number of hostages confirmed killed after the terrorists stormed the Chabad-Lubavitch Jewish Center also continues to grow.
The protection of our citizens abroad should be one of the highest foreign policy priorities for any U.S. administration, but in light of these attacks it should be priority number one for President-elect Obama. The ability of Americans to travel and conduct business abroad without fear of being attacked is not only an imperative in and of itself, but it is essential to keep our economy, which is inextricably tied to global markets, going.
As a counterterrorism analyst, another looming issue must be immediately addressed by the West. There are conflicting accounts as to whether some of the Mumbai terrorists were actually UK citizens. That will no doubt be sorted out in the days to come. It would be no surprise, however, if that proves to be true. If so, this would be more confirmation that the international terrorist network continues to use the West as a base of operations to recruit, to fundraise, and to evade the scrutiny they would otherwise receive in countries that have different conceptions of civil liberties.
As I observed here at PJ Media this past weekend, the trial and convictions last week of five officials of the Holy Land Foundation, the country’s largest Islamic charity, on charges of terrorism support demonstrated how many of the most prominent Islamic organizations in the U.S. are closely associated with extremist and terrorist organizations. Some of these organizations were even listed by federal prosecutors as unindicted co-conspirators in the case. As long as terrorists can rely on these organizations for assistance and can take refuge in the West, including the U.S., while conducting support operations, is a direct threat to Americans in both the short and long term. Dismantling these terrorist support networks is essential to our national security.
And as many signs point to LeT’s involvement in the Mumbai attacks, it should be noted that LeT terrorists are known to be operating inside the U.S. A number of LeT operatives trained in Pakistani terror camps have been arrested, tried, and convicted here at home, most notably those involved in the Northern Virginia jihad network. Other U.S. citizens have trained in LeT camps and been killed in operations, including Jibreel al-Amreekee, a 19-year-old convert to Islam from Atlanta killed in 1997 during a LeT attack on an Indian Army post. And two of the brothers of LeT leader and founder Hafiz Muhammad Saeed were arrested in December 2006 on immigration charges while serving as imams of mosques in the Boston area.
So as Indian authorities continue to sort through exactly what happened in Mumbai last week and determine who exactly is responsible, there are a multitude of issues and concerns for the U.S. Not only may this situation escalate into all-out war between Pakistan and India, while tens of thousands of U.S. servicemen and women are in neighboring Afghanistan, but the terrorist networks behind this attack are not a distant threat, but right here among us. With so much potential fallout from this situation, the U.S. cannot be a passive observer to these events.
Why Don’t the Mullahs Condemn the Mumbai Terrorists?
A NEW direction?
People already forgot 9/11??
I thought that and previous attacks had set the NEW direction.
Do people have SHORT memories and cannot CONNECT the dots?
If we don’t LEARN, we cannot fight back adequately.
The war on terror is bogus. There is no war against the IRA or the LTTE or ETA or FARC. We are in a war against Islam, and it wasn’t us who started it. We cannot win until we admit this fact.
someone is begging india to attack pakistan. since the alternative to war is enduring increasingly terrible terror attacks, war ought to be waged as completely and ruthlessly as possible. pakistan must be solved. like all “postcolonial” states outside of india, it is a complete and utter basket case and object of predation by more cunning and powerful states/empires. right now pakistan is being used as a launching pad against the post-war strategic – and therefore economic – cohesion upon which “globalization” is based. with the current economic crisis, and the fact that india is a wide-open target and a democracy, and the fact that obama is a “security” novice, we must presume that the major attack our enemies desire must be on its way, to the best of their ability. the better plan is to strike first, with overwhelming force, and attempt to turn the tables.
also, i hope there’s some way to get the damn manipulative and cowardly Europeans involved, particularly the French, by subterfuge if necessary. their bullsh*t just cannot continue, not least because – depsite their delusions of granduer – they are *not at all prepared* to lead.
For those of us who have no idea why this keeps happening, we (civilized society) allow this to continue because we do not respond to these vermin appropriately. They have no interest in dialog, money, position, or power. They hate us because of what we are.
Until we get the resolve to eliminate these bugs like the cockroaches that they are, we’re going to continue to see this behavior. We know where these people are from. We need to exterminate their mothers, fathers, wives, children, grandparents, girlfriends, supporters, and pets. We need to make it so painful for them to engage in this activity that they choose to stop.
vivo (morto)
people like yourself that shamelessly vote democrat are part of the problem not of the solution.
Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America has been invited and applauded at the Democratic convention.
She is unapologetically a supporter of jihad, terrorism sympathizer and associate herself with the muslim brotherhood who supports suicide bombings, mandates attacks against American troops, prescribes murder for homosexuals, and discusses how to behead human beings.
You are part of the problem, not of the solution.
I’m sure Rice and Powers have already told him that it’s all Israel’s fault, just like everything else. That’s all he will know, and all he will care to know. Anybody who believes otherwise is deluding himself.
Never fear Obama is here.
The islamic terrorist are having a heck of a job getting traction in China, and for the most part Russia. Why? Hmmm. Both of these country’s leadership are not afraid to crush the problem and those who cause it.
Yeah yeah i know, these admin. also crush good things as well. However, we the US are afraid. Afraid of what the world may say.
Obama is in the tank with these terrorists, he is on their side. It is the US of A’s fault this problem exists and his good buddy wishes he could of done more to harm the US of A.
Never fear Obama is here,
Frank is correct. The attacks in India were primarily to kill Americans and Brits; since both countries lead the charge against islamic terrorists. Let’s be honest and upfront, it is a war against islamic terrorists and we must engage them everywhere they are….unless the libs woudl rather engage them here in the USA. After all, if the islamists defeat the USA, the rest of the world would be more easily conquered in a piecemeal fashion (even China would have to recognize that their country’s growth would not come if the West was gone).
“The islamic terrorist are having a heck of a job getting traction in China, and for the most part Russia. Why? Hmmm. Both of these country’s leadership are not afraid to crush the problem and those who cause it.”
possibly, but perhaps the reason is that they are behind the terrorists?
have you ever, for example, seen the movie made by the marine who went to darfur and, as a member of a UN peacekeeping mission, managed to film the areas that are generally off-limits to foreigners?
the footage is of janjaweed hanging around in the shade of chinese oil platforms.
think about it. i don’t care what anyone says: someone is feeding the hindu kush weapons and training and a strategic sensibility; this is not just some autochthonous dervish evil arising spontaneously out of the asian landmass.
also think of it this way: which countries are effectively invulnerable because of nuclear arsenals and brutal dispositions? russia and, to a lesser extent, china.
ever notice how russia used to control communist movements inside persia, afghanistan (remember what that war was about?)? remember its close arab clients?
and yet – the media being what it is, respect for our government being what it is, how could anyone actually accuse russia and/or china of being behind it? would not the person who announced that alliance be ridiculed off the stage and out of politics?
but come on. put two and two together, my friends.
You all’s comments make this sound so simple one way or the other. As Patrick points out, there is “potential fallout” between Pakistan and India resulting from this despicable act. And while I agree the US cannot be a “passive observer” to these events, we also cannot help trigger two nuclear powers into war–it would spell doom for any future efforts in Afghanistan if tensions between Pakistan and India boiled over. This is a delicate situation that must be balanced in order to try and get Pakistan to let US or International Forces monitor and attack those camps within its lawless boundaries (primarily Warzistan in the northwest corner of Pakistan). I’d be interested to hear other thoughts that do not imply eradicating everyone who owns a Koran.
Dear God, let Obama grow a set soon.
Vivo’s comments lay bare the left’s real problem with the outgoing adminstration’s anti-terrorist strategy and tactics. George Bush had an (R) after his name instead of a (D). It looks like we can only successfully fight the war against Islamic terroists when the Democrats are in power because they Republicans will always support firm action while the Democrats put party before country even in wartime.
Any sense of history there jerryofva? How about Wilson or Roosevelt during the two world wars?
It’s a new direction only in that this is clearly state-supported terrorism.
Will Blunt:
What in the world does Wilson and Roosevelt have to do with the behavior of today’s Democrats? Today’s Democrats have more in comment with the Communist/Popular Front opponents of Roosevelt’s support to the allied cause from September 1, 1939 through June 22, 1941 then they do with the Democratic Party of Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Johnson. The leftist of WWII didn’t fight for the United States, they fought for Stalin. Today’s Democrats are the same way. They don’t fight for the country, they fight for “Dear Leader.”
“Any sense of history there jerryofva? How about Wilson or Roosevelt during the two world wars?”
Yeah, both those wars were marked by the refusal of the Republicans to support the Democrat POTUS in his role as c-in-c, and by constant attempts by treacherous Republicans to undercut the war efforts.
Not.
Your inital statement came off more generalized than your response; contemporarily, far be it from me to speak for the whole of either party (nor would I want to). The notion that the dems will behave this way once Obama takes office in January is yet to be seen. Therefore, no need to play the soothsayer.
Two words…Nuclear bomb…enough said
Will Blunt:
I have re-read my post and see that I made no refrence to anything outside the current times. I can only conclude that at best you read too quickly to comprehend my post and at worst came back with a stock answer betting I wonldn’t respond.
Will Blunt,
Jerry has not been soothsaying, but looking at the behavior of the Democrats and liberals in general over the past several years (with rare exceptions like Lieberman, purged from the Democratic Party for his excessive loyalty to the USA). He might go back even further. Failure to support the US government in its struggles with enemies of the US has been a hallmark of the Democrats throughout my entire adult lifetime. It goes back to Vietnam. As Jerry says, today’s Democratic Party is fundamentally different, with respect to foreign affairs and defense, than the party of FDR and Truman (or of JFK for that matter).
aaargh – politics.
the main thing about this attack was how freaking brazen and sustained it was – 10 guys carrying enough ordinance to lay seige to a city’s major commercial landmarks for 3 days with no way out and expectation to die?
the point of the attack could not possibly have been to just kill people.
and attacks in mumbai itself have been happening with rapidly increasing frequency for the last two years.
why?
in my view, because someone wants a war between Pakistan and India.
why?
in my view, because it would commit all of pakistan’s troops to the east, and because india would likely only wage a limited war.
under the conventional narrative, the good thing about that from the point of view of the jihadis is that pakistan’s government could not possibly survive politically, even if it survives physically. the government would fall, the ISI/Islamists would get their hands on the government of a major state and a nuclear arsenal.
under the unconventional narrative, whatever happens in pakistan/india, the USA will surely have to be involved in some respects and in any case the USA’s Afghan mission will be utterly complicated by the totally free hand the Taliban/Pashtuns get there.
and if the same people behind the Mumbai attack also have the ability to, at the same time, ratchet up the iraq attacks (which is starting already, by the way), the USA will either be pretty bruised, or forced by Obama to pull out prematurely.
and what if these “people” have some influence over the anti-war US/European Left? or even correspondants in the MSM/editorial boards?
eh?
see what i’m saying? this is bad. india should make up its mind to conquer Islamabad and we could do some much-needed joint carpetbombing of the Hindu Kush.
I was led by the left and MSM to believe terrorism was a figment of Bush and Cheney’s imagination.
Go to homelandsecurityus.com and read Doug Hagaman article about how easily this can happen in any city anywhere anytime. There is a picture of a shot up school bus where they are known to train in New York, and those bozos give them a parade.
Instead of using those 20,000 troops on our homeland to train how to defend our nuclear power plants HA, why don’t we deploy them to get those towelheads in Pakistan and those pirates in Somalia. Better yet fly B52′s and carpetbomb where those pirates live and no more attacks.
19 Kelly first word great second word bombs. Just carpetnuke from Algeria to Pakistan and Obama can meet his 16 month timeline in Iraq.
Dan makes a very important, very scary point: they want to get their hands on all the nuclear power in the region. you know what they’ll do with it.
i don’t know about you but i feel breathing down our necks. i see them at the clinic at the largest hospital complex in new york, allowed to wander around wearing those hijabs with their faces covered. “security” guards don’t ask them for id. i was seeing them week after week, until one strolled past carrying an unchecked shopping bag. i went to the main security station to report it. they sent someone to follow her (him?)
back over at the guard, i explained that this is how they get the layout of a place, by walking around. that was a few weeks before mumbai.
the fingerprints of islamic terrorists, al queda, hamas, hezbolla, every dirtbag one of them is all over the mumbai thing. reporters never mention the involvement of the other scum, as if this is separate. right. and so are the somali scum who today attacked an american cruise ship.
we better get our sht together really fsst.
Here is the only thing that everyone MUST take away from the Mumbai Attack-
The Ultimate Lesson of Mumbai- Save the Last Clip for Yourself and Your Family
The “hostages” of Mumbai had not absorbed the lesson of 9/11. The captives that were taken, tortured disfigured and murdered in Mumbai were no less doomed than the passengers on the airliners on 9/11. They allowed themselves to be taken and abused by captors who did not want anything from them but to use them as instruments of terror. Only the brave passengers of flight 93 understood and acted on this. Let no westerner ever rationalize ignorance of this from this day forward…
….When (unless we wake up and do something, it is not a question of “if”) you are attacked, you are going to have to fight as hard as you can, for as long as you can if you want to have any hope of surviving. We have seen what they do to captives so you must never leave yourself at their mercy- they have none….
http://breathofthebeast.blogspot.com/2008/12/lessons-of-mumbai-to-long-for-bumper.html
6. susan:
How many times do I have to tell you that I’m not a Democrat?
Why can’t you read my writings LITERALLY?
You go OFF the tangent it’s pathetic.
10 dan:
“but come on. put two and two together, my friends.”
That one of the “connecting the dots” I mentioned.
15. Tom Holsinger:
“It’s a new direction only in that this is clearly state-supported terrorism.”
I buy that if it’s TRUE.
Let’s connect the dots . . .
Everyone is missing the point here:
This was done with 10 GUYS!
This can happen again ANYWHERE.
How do you fight that?
SOMEBODY has to have the RIGHT answer.
The only one I can hear is INFILTRATION at the sources. All over the World. And Intelligence.
Now I can see that if this doesn’t work and desperation occurs, bombing whole populations is the next step. (I don’t like this step).
also, i hope there’s some way to get the damn manipulative and cowardly Europeans involved, particularly the French, by subterfuge if necessary. their bullsh*t just cannot continue, not least because – depsite their delusions of granduer – they are *not at all prepared* to lead.
how comes that the brave mouthy Danny doesn’t know, that we were the firsts hit by muslim attacks, for you and alike, history started by 9/11, but for us it started 2 more decades before, and we didn’t wait for enlightened american advises for fighting the muslim jihadists, Mitterand created a special court, with special anti-terrorism judges, the most famous one was Brugières, (digg in the net for his special attributions) we have the most performant renseignements services with Israel concerning the jihadism threat, can’t say that from the US, it ‘s rather “much ado for nuthin”, see ya, what has become your CIA watch with its human factors
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YjIxMTdiNDU4MDI0N2VlMWQ5M2E1MDgzMTM4MDc2MjI
so ta gueule connard, and I am a french light narcissic, while I guess you are a total deluder
How generous of you to take time away from prosituting yourself to Colonel Qaddafi, madame.
Everyone needs to listen to DAN and Thinking person they laid it out straight forward.
Now only if Obama can grow a SET we might see some REAL change for the good, not for the left loons
“How generous of you to take time away from prosituting yourself to Colonel Qaddafi, madame.”
oh dear, you forgot that your country was the first to lift the boy-cott, um after that the american families got paid billions of dollars for Lockerbee, while the french families only got the lest dusts for Tenéré., but was obliged to acknoledge the american decision that Ms Rice accomplished so well, followed by ultra-brite Blair in the path, though the Germans were discretly making businesses long time before.
Do you know that Khadafi’s sons live in Paris and were/are part of the “jet-set” people that shows they have plenty of money to waste, one was actually the former Sarkozy’s wife friend.
The EU had this problem of the bulgarian nurses to solve for many years, and still no progress was made.
Khadafi wanted to get back in the “correct” club, cuz he need badly to improve the Lybians situation, one never knows, rebellions was murmuring… though he need one neutral personnality in the western world to introduce him,Sarkozy until yet had no frying-pans left in the Arab world behind, and there was still that bulgarian nurses problem, the deal was to solve the both, Celilia Sarkozy was the convenient agent, she knew already part of the Khadafi family, and papy Khadafi was only trusting her.
um, the arms market was already full, ie America and Blair, except for the planes, eh, I wonder why, seems that ours are performent, also for the civil nuclear energy, So far your not the specialists… but don’t make us believe that the same as nuclear arms, (you want me to provide you links that explains you the difference), cuz french civil nuclear ain’t american’s or canadian’s technology, impossible for a terrorist ambition to convert into arm
So cher Monsieur, don’t listen to the falsh sirens, try to digg in the “objective truths”
“osirak”
yeah “osirak”, that’s funny, Israeli got the bomb through stohlen plans and through french help, they should have known that you can’t make a bomb through civil treated uranium, too sophisticated to restaure as a mere stuff, (wich was not the case for the canadian and american system, where uranium wasn’t treated, though you sold it to Pakistan, may-be Saddam didn’t know that, anyway the main idea there was to ruin Saddam’s agenda, but nonentheless didn’t work, kinda a plouf into water, did you know that America sold him the evil WMD, (ie toxic gaz), yeah, for the good cause, eliminate the iranian devils !!!
what are you blathering about. nothing you say to a historically literate person will convince him that, for all their other virtues and magnificent accomplishments, the french are (1) really not that great at strategy, and (2) assholes. but thanks for playing.
the french are (1) really not that great at strategy,
tell that to your military academies, uh, they learn Napoleon strategies and Algeria war, how the Frenchs managed to control guerillas… General Petraeus is fine with them !!! TOCARD
depends from which sources you read the facts, yours were biased from the origin, normal good ol boy is right by the definition of his moral grandiloquence
I’m not playing with you, I’ll point on your falsh or biased dires, so better provide proofs before, moron
Pakistan and India will no doubt be on top of Obama’s foreign policy plans because relations between India-Pakistan directly relate top the new US administrations plans for Afghanistan.
Obama has made it very clear that he intends to focus his efforts on Afghanistan when he comes into office. If India and Pakistan hostilities escalate then the Pakistani military will not be able to focus its efforts on FATA and the Taliban and Al Qaeda will be allowed to regroup.
The US must help India in its subsequent investigations to uncover the terror plot in Mumbai and pressure Pakistan to finally take a hard stance not just toward terrorists but toward those who support terrorism.
…but nonentheless didn’t work, kinda a plouf into water, did you know that America sold him the evil WMD, (ie toxic gaz)
European companies were quite guilty in supplying Saddam Hussein with chemicals and precursors to producing toxic agents which he proceeded to use on Iraqi citizens.
I believe a Dutchman is one of the few individuals actually convicted of knowingly selling Hussein agents that would be used in the slaughter of innocent populations.
Over time, Iraq also evolved the capability to produce some of these agents (like VX, tabun, mustard gas…) internally.
Germany and France, in particular, did great business with Hussein. There is an old picture of J. Chirac shaking hands with Saddam, his good friend, during Chirac’s first term as President, je crois.